Types of Nonfiction Text
  • Personal Essays
  • Speeches
  • Opinion Pieces
  • Art Essays
  • Biographies
  • Memoirs
  • Journals
  • Historical Selections
  • Scientific Selections
  • Technical Selections
  • Economic Selections


Examples of Informational Text:
“Letter on Thomas Jefferson” by John Adams (1776)
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave by Frederick Douglass (1845)
“Blood, Toil, Tears and Sweat: Address to Parliament on May 13th,1940” by Winston Churchill (1940)
Harriet Tubman: Conductor on the Underground Railroad by Ann Petry (1955)
Travels with Charley: In Search of America by John Steinbeck (1962)


Reading Standards for Informational Text
Key Ideas and Details:
Students must:
  • know how to cite text. (Explicit and Infer)
  • state the main idea, supporting details, and tell how it was conveyed in a given passage.
  • provide a summary of what was read without including personal opinion or judgement.
  • analyze in detail how a key individual, event, or idea is introduced, illustrated, and described in the text.
Craft and Structure:
Students must:
  • determine the meaning of words and phrases; including figurative, connotative, and technical meanings.
  • analyze how a certain sentence, paragraph, chapter, section fits into the overall text and contributes to the text.
  • identify the author's purpose and decided if it was conveyed.
Integration of Knowledge and Ideas:
Students must:
  • integrate information presented in different media, formats, or words to develop a coherent understanding.
  • analyze evidence from an argument deciding which claims are supported and which are not.
  • compare/contrast one author to another. (Memoir written by one author compared to a biography of the same person.
Range of Reading and Level of Text Complexity:
Students should:
  • be able to read and comprehend grade level appropriate nonfiction proficiently. (Scaffold when needed.)